Retention of related and unrelated sentences

Memory for meaningful information was studied in 5 experiments investigating the effect on retention exerted by one sentence upon another when learned together as part of a set. Each experiment used 10th or 11th graders (N = 404) from a different school. Effects were hypothesized to result from semantic linking by common concepts or by linking that reflected semantic ordering. Linking of sentences improved retention in 2 of the 1st 3 experiments; in the other, where overt answers to questions about the sentences were not required at the time of learning, retention was not enhanced. The last 2 experiments indicated that semantic ordering of sentences increased the number of sentences retained and that this effect was greater than could be accounted for by common linking concepts. (17 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved).